Working anytime and anywhere

By VIKKI BLAND

Technologically speaking, you can do it anytime and almost anywhere. You can do it on holiday, while overseas or in the privacy of your own home. You can do it fulltime or part-time; you can even do it in a boat.

Teleworking describes using information technology and telecommunications services to work a salaried job from somewhere other than the office. Think a laptop on a beach, a handheld computer on a boat, a PC from home. If all you need to do your job is access to your email, diaries and the information and applications on your employer's computer network, you are a potential candidate for teleworking.

The benefits of teleworking are well touted and dreamed about: no commuting; less traffic stress and city noise; more time for night owls to sleep in; and being able to do the school run or spend time with a new baby.

Liz Cuplan understands the family advantages of teleworking well. A new mother, Cuplan has continued working part-time for Auckland based accounting firm Prince and Partners, through teleworking.

"I do about three days a week, all of it here at home while [my baby] either sleeps or plays. It's been great to get back up to speed without sacrificing time with Benjamin and without having to leave him at day care or whatever."

Colin Wilson, a senior partner with Prince and Partners, says the firm employs 40 staff, and up to 12 regularly telework from home or other locations.

"Maternity is one reason, but we have people who work all or part of the day from home to avoid Auckland's traffic problems. Some telework to minimise the interruptions they might get if they were working from the office."

Wilson says Prince and Partners has always supported teleworking, which he says makes a lot of sense.

"Retaining senior people is crucial. If there are obstacles to our people working normal office hours, we don't want to waste our investment in them or compromise the value they bring to our business by losing them - we'd rather they were teleworking."

Prince and Partners have overcome a common employer fear of teleworking: loss of control over employees.

Such concerns are not entirely without grounds. While an employee may be generally responsible about teleworking, arguments can occur over issues such as paying home generated business bills (such as phone calls) and whether the business should pay for an extra phone line or PC for the employee's home.

And there's always the worry about whether information transferred from a company network to the home computer of an employee will remain secure.

Employers realise that the security of corporate data relies as much on the common sense and integrity of the teleworker as it does on information technology. For example, children and teenagers commonly use file sharing applications which allow anyone on the internet to access files stored on a computer hard drive.

As part of a formal teleworking policy, companies may require their teleworkers to use a computer that is kept separate from friends and family.

But while such concerns are valid, many employees, particularly those in senior positions, have long teleworked on an informal basis, dialling into the office network from a laptop or PC on the weekend, while travelling, or on holiday.

The main criteria for allowing people to telework, says Wilson, should simply be whether they can do their jobs from home. Requests to telework should be assessed on the merits of the employees and their value to the company.

"We allow people to request things that seem reasonable. Obviously, you wouldn't want your entire workforce working from home. But money is only part of the solution. What people really want is a good balance between home and work in their lives."

Prince and Partners is comfortable about teleworking employees having access to its private computer network.

"We did a lot of research around IT security. Telecom was helpful to us and we use a package they call Remote Office, which gives us security software and a virtual private network [VPN]." Such a network offers a private and secure internet connection.

However, the technological path to teleworking does not always run smooth. Not every rural corner of New Zealand has access to a fast internet connection for example. And some problems with dial-in procedures have nothing to do with the quality of a telecommunications set up. One Auckland teleworker regularly has trouble dialling into his company's computer network because there's no VPN and the modem at the network end doesn't always answer his dial-in call.

"It's a small office and someone may have been using the modem for something else and not reset it, or they may have simply turned it off," he says. "If I can't find someone to reset the modem, I have to make an 80-minute round trip into the office."

The teleworker adds that people who alternate between telework and office work sometimes leave important documents behind when they switch locations. "It pays to be organised."

Human error aside, the outlook for teleworking in New Zealand is good. Not only are faster internet connections increasingly available across the country but security technologies have improved and mobile networks have improved in coverage, speed, and mobile data capacity. The fast evolution of wireless telecommunications products and services also bodes well for the future of teleworking.

Happily, the cost of supporting teleworking is now more within the reach of smaller businesses. Providers such as Telecom have created packages such as Remote Office and VPN rental schemes. Rival provider TelstraClear offers similar deals through its Connect and Dial Connect packages.

"Teleworking is a lot more accessible to companies as a result of a drop in telecommunications pricing," says Wilson.

So why don't more employees telework? While exact numbers are hard to come by, one glance at a motorway in rush hour suggests more people could be teleworking. International research also suggests that formalised teleworking has not grown as expected. If the technologies are there and pricing is not prohibitive, where do the barriers lie?

The answer may surprise: although some employers resist teleworking, international research suggests as many employees as employers baulk at the idea of fulltime teleworking.

In an interview with CFO Magazine last year, Tom Worthington, a teleworking IT consultant and past president of the Australian Computer Society said the reason more people don't telework is they don't like the isolation.

"Sitting there by yourself isn't much fun," he said. "Office banter makes the difference- there's a lot of that water-cooler [communication] stuff and it happens up and down the hierarchy."

The effects of teleworking on an individual may be quite personal. For example, a Russian-born teleworker says she is having trouble maintaining a grasp on the English language.

"It was easy in the office where I was surrounded by English speakers. Here at home I find myself thinking in Russian and finding it harder to communicate in English."

Given our communal natures, the more realistic desire of most people is probably to telework part-time to achieve the work/life balance Wilson refers to.

"Teleworking allows people to fit work schedules in with their home life. If our staff want to avoid the traffic they can work from home until about 10 and then come in.

"If they've recently had a baby they might want to telework for a while; if they're working on a big project they might want to avoid office interruptions. Teleworking has been very good for us."

With the right set up, policies, and consideration of personal circumstances, teleworking has the potential to be very good for employees, too.